fanciful
AdjectiveWordNet 3.0
Adjective (3)
- indulging in or influenced by fancy“a fanciful mind”“all the notional vagaries of childhood”Synonyms: notional
- not based on fact; unreal“the falsehood about some fanciful secret treaties — F.D.Roosevelt”“a small child's imaginary friends”“to create a notional world for oneself”Synonyms: imaginarynotional
- having a curiously intricate quality“a fanciful pattern with intertwined vines and flowers”
Webster's Dictionary (GCIDE)
1.Full of fancy; guided by fancy, rather than by reason and experience; whimsical; as, a fanciful man forms visionary projects. [1913 Webster]
2.Conceived in the fancy; not consistent with facts or reason; abounding in ideal qualities or figures; as, a fanciful scheme; a fanciful theory. [1913 Webster]
3.Curiously shaped or constructed; as, she wore a fanciful headdress. [1913 Webster]
Gather up all fancifullest shells.— Keats.
Syn: Imaginative; ideal; visionary; capricious; chimerical; whimsical; fantastical; wild.
Usage: Fanciful, Fantastical, Visionary. We speak of that as fanciful which is irregular in taste and judgment; we speak of it as fantastical when it becomes grotesque and extravagant as well as irregular; we speak of it as visionary when it is wholly unfounded in the nature of things. Fanciful notions are the product of a heated fancy, without any tems are made up of oddly assorted fancies, aften of the most whimsical kind; visionary expectations are those which can never be realized in fact. -- Fan"ci*ful*ly, adv. -Fan"ci*ful*ness, n. [1913 Webster]